As you know Debian is just the opposite of Arch in terms of updates. The Debian people are very conservative about releasing updates. So, I am curious to know. Those of you who are using Arch for a long time, do you like Debian too ?
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Debian Stable, yes, but Sid rolls right along until the soft freeze. Thereâs been a few instances that I can recall software being available for Sid before hitting Arch stable repos.
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Debian Sid is pretty awesome. I wouldnât use Debian Stable on a desktop (too old for my hardware anyways), but for servers sometimes you want old, battle-tested software and donât want to upgrade constantly.
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Debian is the basis underneath my Rolling Rhino - and I started out with apt-get - so no bad feelings. I just got tired of not knowing what was going on in there!
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Debian is great for servers and computers with a specific purpose (like driving a CNC machine).
For general use desktop PCs, I need fresher software than what is in Debian repos.
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IME Debian is great for servers and rubbish for desktops that needed up to date software that fell outside the ability to update (eg Skype, viber, nvidia) for one reason or another. Thatâs why ubunut became so popular, as they worked on the out of the box experience improving on the solid Deb base.
I love Deb on the server. 
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I have a Debian Stable install on an old desktop PC (Core 2 Duo + basic GPU). Itâs used for distributed computing mainly. Medical research number crunching via BOINC. It just sits there and does itâs thing, stable and solid.
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Debian on personal mom n pop desktop is for people whoâve given up on life. 
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Harsh! Some people just want a low maintenance experience. Also people running servers do not require bleeding edge updates. We are not all alike. Different things for different situations. 
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But I was talking about desktop users, not servers, wasnât I? Gimme Debian on server every day, and leave your Arch at home. 
Also, come on, a distro like Manjaro, for example, is pretty low maintenance. Not really server class but for an everyday desktop itâs fairly low maintenance and still very up-to-date. One fortnightly system update isnât too much for computer users that havenât given up yet, is it?
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Yeah, I just thought the comment on âgiving up on lifeâ was a bit harsh, thatâs all. Weâre talking computer operating systems here not life itself, although I do understand youâre just making a point. 
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So, not actually a huge fan of bleeding edge. I really want somewhere in between. I want recent, but not bleeding edge software. So neither fits my desires perfectly. But I do tend to love Debian. Although, to be fair, my Debian installs are frankenDebians. Currently theyâre all Bullseye (could no longer install Firefox current from SID without upgrading to testing/sid without a LOT of backporting so since itâs in freeze just went ahead and upgraded), I have Plasma 5.22.2, etc. But Debian because if I donât butcher it just WORKS every time, without fail, without exception, I do admit I adore it. At the end of the day, I like âit just worksâ and Debian absolutely âjust worksâ.
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I confess that Iâve never tried Debian Sid out of a bit of trepidation. While recently experimenting with i686 distros, however, I did go with Debian Testing for a while and was content with the selection of newer, but not bleeding-edge, packages.
I have to confess that the idea of Ubuntu Rolling Rhino intimidates me a bit. This comes from some long-ago experiences trying to track one of the early development versions of Ubuntu right after the release of the previous version. I forget the details, but there was some major change that seemed to break everything to the point where I ended up reinstalling the whole system. I could probably deal with something like that now, but I have to admit that parts of the whole Debian infrastructure still confuse me.
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MX Linux is an operating system based on Debian. For people who are new to Linux (perhaps a friend or relative to whom you have made a recommendation to try Linux) it is an almost ideal âfirstâ GNU/Linux operating system.
It is a simple system - simple to use, simple to update, simple to maintain, yet comprehensive in the programs available for it.
It even comes complete with its own âbuilt-inâ User Manual. This manual is easy to read, easy to comprehend and will tell the novice almost everything he/she needs to know.
If (when) such a person becomes familiar and more experienced with using a GNU/Linux operating system and its programs, at that point you might introduce him/her to EndeavourOS which will introduce the person to Arch (and will probably then become his/her âmainâ computer operating system).
But MX Linux (or some other system based on Debian) is, I feel, the best way to introduce people to Linux.
My opinion only âŚ
Lawrence
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I always loved Debian (and used it many many yearsâŚ). If there wasnât EOS and its friendly community, i think i will be again on Debian. Surely there is less novelties than in arch, and there is not an AUR for Debian. But running a so stable distro with a so strong history is always a pleasure.
For me, for my use on a desktop, there are a lot of reasons I donât run debian
- Debian and Debian testing both have packages which are often too old for my liking
- The problem with SID is: " Please note that security updates for unstable distribution are not managed by the security team. Hence, unstable does not get security updates in a timely manner."
- Debianâs strict free policy isnât my thing, philosophically speaking
- Although I used them for years, I donât enjoy apt/dpkg. At this point, I find them inferior to most other package managers used by modern distros.
- Running Debian as a desktop with the software I use requires adding a ton of repos to make everything work and I donât really enjoy that approach.
At the end of the day, I just think there are lots of better options for my personal use. That being said, this is one of those things where everyone has a different opinion because we all have our own use cases.
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A point needed to be made.
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Have you considered using the Flatpak version of Firefox? I did a bit of testing in Virtualbox of Debianâs upcoming release since Iâm considering installing it for my parentâs computer when visiting next month and found it to be pretty reliable with the exception of ugly fontsâwhich was resolved after updating the Flatpak Gnome components to 40.
The ten+ year old laptop lying around that does refuse to die and is only checked and updated every six months ⌠Debian is a fine distro for that and I appreciate it for it.
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Totally agree with all this. Debian was the distro that rescued me from the Apple/Windowz waters, manyâŚmanyâŚMANY years ago, so it will always have a special âfirst loveâ place in my heart. With that said, looking back, I would never return.
SID was the closest thing to a semi-rolling release, but is way to unstable, even with the few distros that try and calm it. I always had breaking issues, both micro and macro. The worst part though was if you wanted outside or recent software, you ended up adding repos (equivalent to our AUR) which in turn imparted a security risk, added maintenance and made upgrading a nightmare. It is basically up to YOU to update added repos. Yeah, fun learning curve, but like a lot of things, I am too old for that 
.
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